OK. I am going to stick my neck out here...
I don't get it. Am I the only one outraged here?
Here, in this story, it says:
A source at AMD said 50 percent of the job cuts would affect the company’s North American operations, where around half of the firm’s workforce is based. The firm said the cuts would “occur across all functions globally,” and were necessary in order to “re-balance the workforce skill set.”
Now, two red flags here:
1. 50 percent of the job cuts would affect the company’s North American operations.
Translation: 50 percennt of this round of cuts squarely target the U.S. engineers.
But the company is saying, "let's not call that. Let's call it 'global cuts.'"
2. The firm says that cuts were necessary in order to “re-balance the workforce skill set.”
Could AMD please explain what they mean by "re-balance" the workforce skill set?
More importantly, what do they mean by "skill set" in this context?
What "skill set" do North American engineers lack?
I think we all want to know that.

It seems to me that the job cuts are balanced across the board since 50% of the job cuts will affect North America which accounts for ~50% of the workforce. This does not seem particularly biased to me. As for skill set, I guess they want to hire more from the high growth regions (Far East) to build systems that suit those markets e.g. in the mobile segment. Again this does not seem to me as a bad idea, and the market agrees so it should be good for shareholders. That said, I am sure lower cost is a further sweetener :-) The question however is not what skill set do North American engineers lack? but what skill set do North American engineers have and other engineers around the world lack? If AMD can get the same value elsewhere at a lower cost, then shareholder value requires them to move these jobs elsewhere.
PS. Sad for the people who are going to be laid off though.

Let's don't put salt on their wounds.
In general, EE engineers are numb to such news because it is already a kind of industry standards to do some cuts before Thanksgiving and Christmas.
But if you had experienced many times of such cuts and you are still psychologically strong to feel no pain of that, you are welcome to show your strength.

AMD is already in the industry for long time and I think they have a good pool of talents. What kind of skill set are they now looking for? Is it something that can't be changed learnt internally? Even though going towards mobile may be what they need, does it mean the engineering skill for this technology is so different? It seems like a AMD has lost the patient for a good meal but too hungry so fast food is more realistic! Too sad to see such move!

It's not about AMD alone, the whole shareholder-value driven system is to blame if we are to put the blame on someone/something. Capital and jobs will go to where shareholder value is maximised. Social responsibility is something corporates add to their annual reports to embellish them....

Datasheets.com Parts Search

185 million searchable parts
(please enter a part number or hit search to begin)

My Mom the Radio StarMax MaxfieldPost a commentI've said it before and I'll say it again -- it's a funny old world when you come to think about it. Last Friday lunchtime, for example, I received an email from Tim Levell, the editor for ...

A Book For All ReasonsBernard Cole1 CommentRobert Oshana's recent book "Software Engineering for Embedded Systems (Newnes/Elsevier)," written and edited with Mark Kraeling, is a 'book for all reasons.' At almost 1,200 pages, it ...